Medical What should I do about committee letters not getting submitted?

[Mr.Smile12]

Dear Experts,

I hope this post finds you well. I am in a bit of a weird situation with my medical school application. In the last cycle, due to a family emergency, I applied a bit late which resulted in only one late interview that ended with a waitlist position.

This cycle, however, I applied early, filled out all the applications & secondaries early--mostly throughout august, and had everything covered. Early in September, I received an email from one of the schools that my letters are not complete. It seemed bizarre to me because I had a committee letter that included 5 letters and a cover letter. I contacted AAMC and it seemed that my pre-medical advising committee has messed up on the letters and only uploaded the cover letter without any actual letter attached to it. This is when I shattered into pieces!

I have a decent MCAT (509 total with 97 percentile on Biology and Biochem section--lowest on CARS with 124) and a decent GPA (3.97 with only one B in total undergraduate). I also have a unique application, research experience, volunteering experience, more than 1000 hours of paid tutoring experience, and so on, and so forth.

I contacted the committee, they fixed the letter. I asked them if they could do something to make up for their mistake (I.E. contact individual schools) and they said we can't do that.

I have sent emails to individual schools, some have responded to me and some have ignored me.

As you know, this process is so draining and by the end of this cycle, my MCAT becomes 2 years old... given that I am a non-traditional applicant, I really don't have more resources to dedicate to this process- not to be a complainer, but I really dedicated whatever I could in the past 4-5 years and its a bit discouraging that I cannot get people who I envy a lot and are heros to me to spend 10 minutes to do something correctly for me.

I applied to 26 schools this cycle and unfortunately, I only received one interview from a school that did not take any letter of recommendation. In a sense, I am confident that the premedical committee mistake has been detrimental to my application. I am looking for feedback or a way to get out of this problem and I honestly think if someone only gives me a chance and read my file, everything will be different.

I have my primary application and secondaries, and if you decided to help me and had time to review it, I will be happy to send it to you. I did not know if it would be the right thing to attach them to this post-- and if it's not against SDN policy and procedure. That is why I did not do it. Any suggestion about what I do or how I approach this issue would be really appreciated.

Once again, I sincerely apologize for coming here and bringing my less than ideal circumstances for you all. I hope I can make it up by doing the same for someone else one day.

Sincerely,
Masih

It is unfortunate but not a complete loss. If you let the schools know of the error and that a revised committee letter is available, they probably would put you back in the queue. I'm also guessing the prehealth advisor or committee chair would have also let you know they have contacted all the schools on your list.

You have to go through the proper procedures. We do not review applications on this forum. Most schools know when a mistake is not your fault and will likely give you the benefit of the doubt.

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[TheBoneDoctah]

I am sorry to hear that you are going through this. It’s a bump in the road but you can get through this. It is still pretty early. Your GPA is stellar. Give it some time. You fixed the letter issue and contacted the schools. I’m not sure what else you can do at the moment.

 

[tantacles]

it sounds like you have done the right thing in e-mailing individual schools. It is also early in the cycle. Wait and see what happens. I wish you the best of luck.